Five Minutes With Michael Schwab
To many surf contest watchers, the recent Natural Selection hit out at Micronesia raised some eyebrows. What was it? How does it work?
Yet if you've got a snowboarding or big mountain background, chances are you'd know full well what it was and how it works. You were probably keen to see surfing finally pick up the idea.
You see, Natural Selection Tour is the brainchild of US snowboarder Travis Rice. Rice wanted a competitive format that sidestepped the rigidity of organised runs and technical scoring, that lent more on artistry and improvisation while still awarding a winner.
Technology plays a big part in the concept as, in Natural Selection snowboarding at least, wild terrain is accessed and captured via drone. Footage that was once the preserve of an annual film release was now viewed and judged in real time.
Natural Selection found an enthusiastic audience in snowboarders, which was reason enough for Rice to expand the base. Hello surfing and MTB.
The recent surfing version had many commenters thinking Natural Selection would be the death knell of the WSL - the rebel tour had finally arrived. Yet unbeknownst to most, the guy who's backing the venture is also a WSL shareholder and he has an altogether different view on the matter.
Swellnet: First of all Michael, where are you from and how long have you been surfing?
Michael Schwab: I’m originally from Menlo Park California up in the San Francisco Bay Area. I first surfed when I was 16 in Pebble Beach, but didn’t really get into it until I was 30.
What are your favourite waves?
Cloudbreak, One Palm, Micronesia, Teahupoo, Bo’a in Rote.
What boards are you currently riding?
I have some Christensons I really love right now, but I’d say I foil more these days with Armstrong.
Michael piloting a black-railed Christenson through an Indo pipe (Stu Gibson)
Are you financially involved in the whole Natural Selection Tour venture or just the surfing aspect?
Yes, I am a board member and an investor in the Natural Selection Tour, which includes all four sports [snowboarding, skiiing, surfing, mountain biking].
I first invested in 2020.
How did this come about, and equally importantly, why are you so interested in it?
I believe Travis [Travis Rice - founder of Natural Selection Tour] read an article about my involvement with the Kelly Slater Wave Company, the Surf Ranch, and my project in La Quinta, California, where we were going to build the Kelly Slater wave. Then he emailed me in the middle of the 2020 pandemic.
I'm a lifelong snowboarder and I love that world. I loved his ideas and what he wanted to do in the world of snowboarding.
As you just mentioned, you're an investor in what are now WSL assets - the Kelly Slater Wave Company. Does Natural Selection jeopardise the WSL's position as the arbiter of performance surfing?
I first invested in the Kelly Slater Wave Company in 2013, and then we were acquired by the WSL. So yes, I’m still a WSL shareholder.
WSL and the Kelly Slater Wave Company own Surf Ranch. Abu Dhabi is a license. I think the WSL and Natural Selection Tour can support each other. It just expands the sport for everyone.
Moving forward, will there be a lone Natural Selection Surf event per year, or are there plans to have more?
Our ultimate goal is to have a tour for each of the four sports with at least two to three events per year, but that will be in the years coming if all goes well.
Will you remain in Micronesia or do you plan to rotate locations, perhaps seeking new zones?
Still yet to be determined, but I can definitely see us going back to Micronesia again.
Hook up in East Nusa Tengarra (Stu Gibson)
'Fan favourites' appears to be the criteria for athlete inclusion in Natural Selection. Who has the final say in this, and do past winners get an automatic invite?
I believe winners get invited again, but a committee decides who participates in each event.
If CT surfers can get permission to go in the Eddie, for example, could a CT surfer go in Natural Selection if they were invited? Would you even contemplate doing so?
I think at some point the WSL would be open to that sort of thing, however we want to be respectful of them.
Regarding your recent contest: Will subsequent contests have the same judging format - no scores but gut feel from a bank of established surfers - or will the system be tinkered with?
This last event was our first and it was also bit of a test. I could see us using that same format, but I could also see us tinkering with it.
Comments
Did he paddle or step off?
Yea think that’s JetSki wake in the background of the second shot (Roti?)
Does that explain it? I thought both shots were pretty solid efforts for someone of his vintage who started surfing at 30. Step offs don't count, particularly if you're lucky (or rich?) enough to have the use of a jet ski in Indo.
Yes he can afford a jetski for steps-offs. Happy to be corrected but seems like he's the son of Charles S which according to Wiki: "As of 2025, his net worth is estimated by Forbes to be $(US) 11.2 billion, making him the 203rd richest person in the world"! Probably even had a spare ski in case 1st one got an oily plug.
Fool me once etc
First Pic - wow thats a damned good keg for a mature aged starter
2nd pic - gives away the truth behind the first shot?
WTF jet skis on Roti?
Michael doing step offs at Roti is just a synonym for how he has loved his life. Always with an assist from a higher power (daddy’s $$). Natural selection will be a failure. Mark my words. Did you see their viewer numbers on the livestream? Was pathetically low. And Travis’ events were cool at first but are now just filled with dorks like Michael roaming around trying to pal it up with every pro.
Honestly I’m not even sure this guy is capable of step offs. May have just been tow ins. This guy gets towed in on his foil at little dume and drives everyone nuts.
His involvement with natural selection is hilarious because he just buys his way in to hang with pro athletes. Just check the comment section on Michael’s instagram account. It’s all bottom feeders being like “oooo sooo sickkk” over and over. Everyone just wants to get on this guys payroll. He pays a videographer to travel with him while getting towed around behind daddy’s hinckley on Nantucket.
And that’s not even getting into all the lame development moves he is doing with daddy’s new surf resort or the golf resort in Palm Springs which are both incredibly harmful to the environment/wildlife.
Thank for that - Suspicions confirmed
I can't see why Natural Selection can't coexist in harmony with the CT.
Everyone was screaming it was the end of golf when LIV came on the scene but as far as I can see the sun rose the next day and golf was better for it.
Bring it on I reckon. Love the format.
Re: the LIV golf tour
It has been good to give the complacent PGA tour management a shakeup and it has been a boon for pro golfers. The PGA has had to up prize money and LIV players are getting fabulous money for less work.
On the downside, PGA TV viewing figures in the USA have been down about 20%, while the LIV tour TV viewing numbers in the USA are disastrous. Significantly, the LIV tour ratings aren’t helped by being a world tour with inconvenient time zones for the US market. But in a recent LIV event in Saudi Arabia, the average U.S. audience was 12,000. Last weekend, which just happened to be the biggest non-major PGA event at the same time as a LIV tournament in Singapore. The PGA audience was 100 times bigger than the LIV tour audience.
Overall, since LIV, pro golf viewership worldwide seems to be down. It has damaged the PGA while not creating a significant viewership for LIV. This is while golf playing is booming, particularly in the 20 to 40 age group, after a long fallow period.
The Natural Selection surfing event is not currently in competition with the WSL. I don’t see any issues there.
I stand corrected Wally but the LIV is still in its infancy.
And you're right, the PGA did need a shakeup. I don't know how Monaghan kept his job though. Hypocrisy writ large.
Schwab is the money behind complicating land access at Boa and a failed attempt to privatise the wave. He is also the relatively new money at Nihiwatu (aka Ockeys left) and the continuing policy of blocking that wave to anyone not staying at the resort. We have a couple local politicians whom have been reported by his organisation to the police even though said politicians haven't done anything other than raise awareness through discourse with the public, no social or traditional media has yet been posted on the matter, still the politicians were reported clearly as a warning to back off. The police report process is ongoing. These brave politicians are standing up for local and foreign access to the wave, as we've had for decades.
The points above are fact and could not be considered as "fitnah".
An article recently appeared in the AFR travel section promoting the "Boa Development", the article contained several absurd inaccuracies. I just ask that SwellNet and other Australian media tread very carefully with this organisation. Please fact check and cross check what is being said. I care because (and this is opinion only) surf locations are being considered by a small minority as private assets to be controlled and traded by an owner.
G'Day Gaz,
Full disclosure: I originally approached Michael for comment about the Bo'a access issue. I asked quite explicit questions about access and he denied that there would be any limits put on the wave. The only change, according to Michael, is immaterial: a redirection of a walkway.
People may have their own feelings but in this biz I have to take people on their word. So there's no story, though that will change if circumstances change.
It was only when I approached Michael that it dawned on me that he was also the guy behind Natural Selection, hence a quick pivot towards that venture.
That's interesting. If he says the walkway as is now is the status quo then that's probably a good result. This walkway was closed for at least a week during Feb, I say at least a week because I was still using it running the gauntlet, eventually security put up a physical barrier, so it may have been closed longer than my cheeky trespassing. Anyway it's open now. It's likely that the decision to temporarily close that access was made by local management and higher management is not aware. I'll leave the story at that.
Not sure this is much more exciting or different than the WSL. I watched all of it and to be honest, it felt like just another competition.
The biggest issue is the lack of time afforded to the competitors. How is an hour heat much different to a 35 or 40 minute heat in the WSL? In the end, they are both too short and don't give enough time to catch enough waves. Heats should be two hours at a minimum, as that's how often it can take for everyone to get at least 2-4 really good waves. Unless they give an equal opportunity for all surfers to catch enough waves, then it's a joke, like all contests. How can you compare apples and oranges when the apple orchard got all the rain while the orange orchard was in drought? Also make competitors surf at least two heats against the same people as then "luck" is mostly removed.
and for God's sake, Please don't hold contests at barreling waves that are side/on-shore in trade winds.
I love the idea behind all this but the execution is almost as bad as the WSL. Another "Dream Tour" idea about to be flushed down the toilet as far as I can see.
well, after Thursday he might have to paddle into waves , like the rest of us....
Is this the same Charles Schwab, daddy of Micheal Schwab?
https://www.independent.co.uk/tv/news/trump-charles-schwab-stock-market-...